Call for ocean energy focus to be maintained
The CEO of the Western Development Commission, Gillian Buckley, has called on the Government to maintain a strong focus on the harnessing of ocean energy.
Calls by WDC to keep focus on ocean energy
Anton McNulty
THE Government has been urged to keep its focus on the ocean energy programme or face losing the prospect of becoming a world leader in the sector, after it was revealed that only a fraction of the €26 million programme fund has been spent in the last year.
Last January, the Minister for Energy, Eamon Ryan unveiled the ocean energy programme, through which €26 million was to be spent over three years to develop Ireland as the ‘world leader in renewable energy’. Mayo is to play a significant part in the programme with €2 million allocated to develop a grid-connected wave energy test site to be located near Belmullet.
However, it was revealed that only a fraction of the €26 million fund has been spent in the last year and experts have warned that Ireland will lose investors and a valuable opportunity to be at the forefront of technological development if there are further delays. Former US ambassador Thomas Foley had predicted last year that Ireland could be to ocean energy what Finland has been to mobile phones, but was critical of the bureaucratic delays when he believed that US investors were keen to support Irish technology.
Ms Gillian Buckley, CEO of the Western Development Commission, told The Mayo News that agencies in the west in particular needed to focus to ensure that the potential of ocean energy is achieved. She said that in the 1970s Denmark focused on advancing wind energy technology and explained that today 30,000 people are employed in that sector and they produce 60 per cent of all the world’s wind turbines.
“We need to focus on it [ocean energy] and put our resources and energy into it because the potential is huge,” she explained. “We have the resources and the brain power and we need to look at it as a matter of urgency and put more pressure on for its development and to realise its potential. I would like to see the west of Ireland benefit from this by the creation of jobs in technology that would come from the ocean sector. It is an opportunity for job creation in a region that has been so underdeveloped and this could turn it around and into a world leader.”
Labour’s local election candidate, Harry Barrett called on Mayo County Council and the Western Development Commission to form a steering committee to put ocean energy to the forefront and ensure that Mayo benefits from the sector. He said if this programme become a victim of budgetary constraints, he fears that Mayo and the west could lose out to other countries in becoming a world leader in this sector.